Flimflam
by Spring Zephyr
Summary: It was hard to think anyone could look at Takumi right now and not realize 'that guy has a serious crush'. So his little brother decided to discreetly help him out a bit. (Very light Souma/Takumi, request)


**Hey, hey! Who wants to see my impression of the White Rabbit from Alice in Wonderland? "I'M LATE, I'M LATE! ...With uploading this request..."**

 **Zephyr's been busy, okay? ;_; And when I finally managed to start working on this, my internet crapped out on me. There was a bit of genuine laziness/lack of motivation mixed in too though... I really hate the summer months.**

It was hard to think anyone could look at Takumi right now and not realize 'that guy has a serious crush'. Sure, there were lots of people who didn't, but – most of them were members of the Aldini fanclub, people who thought he was cool all of the time despite Takumi obviously being an idiot. They were girls, mostly, setting themselves up for disappointment, partially because Takumi thought it was too rude to directly turn anyone down.

The thing about love – even puppy love, considering the person in question – was that it was full of disappointments. Sometimes even like this one:

"I thought you were going to save me a seat on the bus!"

"I never said I would," Isami reminded his twin. The lack of remorse was written plainly all over his smarmy face. "What I actually said was–"

"Stop," Takumi sighed. "You don't need to remind me."

Let's see, all Isami had really said was... "Try not to take too long in the bathroom or you'll get left behind again". The next time Takumi asked his brother to do anything, he'd have to make a mental note to demand a more specific answer – then again, he had so many mental sticky notes already that he'd probably end up forgetting anyway.

"You might want to hurry up and pick a seat, big bro."

Isami had a pretty girl sitting next to him right now, Tadokoro, in fact, and seemed quite pleased with his current situation, so the odds of him agreeing to change seat partners now were low... If he asked Tadokoro instead, she would probably agree to move.

Or not, now that Takumi looked a little closer.

She had the same sort of determined face she wore while cooking, when everything was going right and her confidence was at its peak, mouth pressed into a thin line and eyes shining with determination. What was so important about making him change seats? If they weren't going to hide the fact that they didn't want Takumi around, then he didn't need to act happy about it either. Takumi stalked off, grumbling to himself, still managing to catch a few snippets along the way –

"I thought the way you guys used that duck – I-I mean, it probably didn't seem that impressive to the two of you, but I can't believe no one else thought of..."

Apparently, this conversation had been going on for a while? (Unbeknownst to Takumi, it had started with "So how well do you know Soma?", and sort of went from there.)

"My brother made such a big deal out if it too," Isami replied, then he started laughing. "Only to get shown up at the end by Soma, haha–"

 _'That ended in tie!'_ Takumi would've retorted. Except Tadakoro beat him to it, and managed to sound less annoyed too.

Using the kaki seeds had been a brilliant idea, sure. But how was Takumi supposed to be Soma's equal if people like his brother went around claiming he'd anyway!?

"But I can tell Soma admires him in a competitive sense, at least!" Tadokoro piped up cheerfully.

Judging by what Takumi had heard earlier, they'd already been on this subject for a while. (He was right, in fact. The conversation had actually begun with Isami asking, "How well do you know Soma?")

And speaking of Soma–

 _Oh no_.

Takumi groaned as he finally lapped back and his eyes fell on the only available seat left on the bus. Neither Isami nor Soma were ever going to let him live this down, were they? Soma even waited until he sat down before raising an eyebrow and quipping, "So 'we'll meet again', eh?"

"Sh-shut up," Takumi snapped back, or at least tried to – since his voice wasn't feeling very cooperative about the whole "snapping" part and his face was even less intimidating than usual while colored like a tomato.

The grin plastered Soma's face bore into him in more than one way, quite a few of which didn't feel particularly good. Was Soma mocking him?

"Lighten up a little."

Said the guy who was currently competing with Isami for worst sense of humor. Just when Takumi thought Soma was finally getting the point, the bus lurched into motion as he said–

"But just so you know, I really am glad we're getting to see each other again so soon."

–he said... _What?_ No, no, Takumi must have heard things wrong. It was noisy and crowded on this bus, or maybe their departure had jostled his brains or something.

"Excuse me?"

"Do you not...?"

Geez, even while looking directly into Soma's eyes, he was having a hard time reading the other boy's intentions. It didn't help that the heat had returned to Takumi's face, so warm it was almost a little painful, and apparently determined to short circuit his brain. So Takumi sat dumbfounded, trying to sort out fantasy from reality – this wasn't exactly a midnight rendevous underneath a moonlit sky, but it was still the same general concept, maybe? At any rate, how was he supposed to answer when he couldn't manage to decide what Soma was talking about?

"I do" sounded like a marriage proposal if he was right, but that was definitely moving too fast, and "I'm sorry?" sounded too confused and too much like a rejection.

"Did Isami put you up to this?" Takumi blurted as soon as the thought crossed his mind. His little brother ditching him, this awkward, roundabout conversation... it practically screamed "outside meddling", now that he thought about it.

He was going to thank Isami, but right after that Takumi was going to kill him.

"I think Tadokoro was in on it too," Soma offhandedly confirmed.

Definitely going to kill him.

 **(I keep getting worse at romance.) All right, due to the state of things around here, I think I should probably stop taking requests for now. I'm posting this one because it was a request and I'll** _ **probably**_ **upload two other fanfiction I wrote for different fandoms, but after that who knows what?**

 **(Those fandoms are RWBY and Tower of God, for the curious.)**


End file.
